“Technologyis helping to connect hospitals and doctors with patients, and needypeople with donors, so we can together repel the pandemic," he said.
Telehealthservices were launched at the beginning of the pandemic for remoteconsultations in Vietnam. About 2,000 central hospitals are now connectedto all district-level hospitals across the country.
Sincethe fourth wave of the pandemic, the telehealth system has opened newconnections with COVID-19 treatment hospitals in Ho Chi Minh City, and with BinhDuong and Long An provinces for transfer of emergency cases amonghospitals.
Asfor other IT uses, HCM City has piloted a search engine at website http://tracuuf0.medinet.org.vn/ to helpfamilies of COVID-19 patients look up information about their healthstatus.
COVID-19patients can also connect with medical staff on apps such as VOV Bacsi24,Giup toi! and Zalo Connect.
VongThanh Cuong, a representative of Giup toi!’s development staff, said it tookonly 30 seconds to connect doctors with people through the app. “That’swhat people expect. When they need help, they need support from expertsimmediately to feel at ease.”
NguyenTruong Nam, Deputy Director of the Information and Technology Department at theMinistry of Health, said the application of ICT in COVID-19 prevention andcontrol has earned achievements in telemedicine, tracing, testing andvaccination.
Ithas also helped connect charity organisations with the needy and peopleaffected by COVID-19.
TheVietnamese messaging application Zalo recently introduced a new feature ZaloConnect, which received more than 320,000 messages in 15 days.
Namsaid that although the application of technology solutions had brought results,local authorities should send accurate instructions to people sothat technology solutions are used more effectively./.